


Repose

by Davechicken



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: M/M, Non-Sexual Intimacy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-08
Updated: 2019-09-08
Packaged: 2020-10-12 09:44:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,212
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20562251
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Davechicken/pseuds/Davechicken
Summary: Crowley's religion: napping with his angel and waking up.It is a good religion.





	Repose

Of all the things he’s responsible for tempting the angel into, by far the best has to be the artform that is successful napping. The sleep that doesn’t go too deep, or too long, and links together like pearls on a thread. Each one perfect, each one beautiful, and a complete world unto itself. 

Aziraphale only really lets himself drift like this after moments of deep intimacy. Whether it be shared food, satisfying art, or physical connection… he needs that nudge to let himself go. And - oh - when he does? He’s even more beautiful than Crowley ever thought possible.

When he’s truly relaxed, the angel’s face is clear from any ‘but what if’, or ‘I really shouldn’t’. He’s untroubled by the world outside, at least for a little while, and the only thing Crowley can see is peace and happiness. He can’t achieve such abandonment himself, but he can bask in the slow tide of his angel’s heartbeat. Can weather the storms sheltered by the spread of his wings.

Can know, too, that he only gets like this because of him. There’s an extra warmth to his cheeks, a deeper ring to his sighs, that Aziraphale only allows himself when they’re together.

One of them will stir first. Either to kiss and trace fingers, or to watch and wait for eyes to open and meet. It doesn’t matter which of them it is, and that moment of recollection, of coming back to the world… it’s always special. Knowing you’ve been so far gone that nothing else existed. Knowing that you were safe enough to let go. A shared bubble of time, a moment when the universe was only you two. 

Crowley feels… special. Important. Wanted. Loved. 

An index finger brushes the hairs on his arm the wrong way, and he shivers at the delicate tingle that echoes all across his body. His spine arches in response, describing the hiss that punctures his lips and enters the ambient air. 

Their eyes meet, and reflect back what they drink in, a loop of give and take. His toes drag against an ankle, and their legs wind deeper together, like the roots of two joined trees. Symbiotic, not parasitic; the branches of them woven in support to reach the hazy light. 

His angel doesn’t speak, not right now. They talk so much, and never seem to run out of things to say. But when the words don’t come, it feels just as right. They will resume when they are ready, as if no gap delayed their thoughts at all. He doesn’t speak, but he smiles with warmth that colours his cheeks like a dawn sky, and affection in the lines around his eyes that connect directly to the strings of his heart. Tighter, tighter, wound like a spring that doesn’t ever snap no matter how taut it’s pulled. 

At some point, they will kiss. They always do. It’s as if a magic spell snarls them tight together, and to refuse the touch would be to risk utter destruction. But they hold out as long as they can, because this should last as long as it can. Skin on skin on soft, yielding fabric. The scratch of weave compared to the lick of flesh. The ache from denying, beautiful now because it won’t last forever. Won’t hurt for years, like it used to. Won’t claw at the good feelings and turn them bitter from doubt and fear. A momentary self-denial is simply pleasure deferred. Allowed to proof like wild yeast in bread left on the window overnight. 

Long eyelashes cast standing-stone shadows over cheeks as they dip. Slices of knives through the light, that lift and show the dance of salt-water oceans below. He knows every fleck, every island in those seas, and he can read a million emotions in a moment. 

He knows him. Truly knows him. Feels the echoing fear inside, when his angel tenses up and tries to look rock-like or brave. Knows the words that say polite things and mean much worse. Remembers the secret things that form laughter like bubbles, giddy in the belly and tickly in the wings. He knows him.

Crowley has had long enough to do so, but only because Aziraphale allowed it. Only because the angel lifted his wing and opened his heart. 

Only because - stiff-kneed and electric shame - Crowley uncoiled the cage around his own. Let his kind words land. Listened, to both good and bad. Knew he was each, and more, and other. Knelt before his sword with head lowered, and trusted it would kiss and not cut. 

But it did cut. It cut at the poison vines choking the sap from his core. Cut the fences he’d built to let salted earth lie barren. Sliced the twine and netting, and caught all the rush that flowed out in his wake. Good. Bad. Other. The magnitude of his existence, too much for him to handle all alone, and somehow… safe, here, in the blue depths of his eyes, the tender pluck of his lips, the fingertip that can hold his whole world aloft from one point of contact. 

Crowley had never thought he could feel love. Not real love. Not the kind that would make him give up everything. Not the kind that would make him ready to give. Not the kind that would - for small windows, if nothing else - mean he felt peace, too. He’d admired, craved, hungered, wanted… longed. He’d circled this infuriatingly not-good not-bad something-else angel and he’d lied and cheated and stolen and then cried and wanted to do better. He’d yearned for something, unable to say what it was, but knowing it was there, like he could see the shadow it cast, and not the thing itself. He’d felt anger, and jealousy, and frustration, and he’d not once been able to say why.

Why? They’d wined and dined. They’d talked for more hours than some countries had even existed. They’d shared stories, and lives, and goals, and dreams, and fears. But it hadn’t been enough. How could it be enough? How could anything be enough? Even now, the start of restlessness slinks in, hooded and smirking. The need to close the distance again. The desire to take control of the emotion, or the expression of it. Even now, safe and sound in his arms.

They will move, because this is too much to take forever. Because he’s weak and he can’t handle the calm for so long. Because he has to think he can say it better when he uses his tongue to pry his lover’s mouth open to lick the secrets onto his tongue. 

Too much of this would kill him. There’s only so much perfection a demon can take. 

He had thought he couldn’t feel love. Not the kind that would give, and not the kind that could make him feel it was his, in return. That he was part and party to something greater, something worth existing for. A fingertip chases a river down his cheek, and presses whorled lines to his lips to kiss. 

It’s everything he’d ever wanted, and he says so when he closes his eyes and pushes his forehead to the angel’s. I love you, he thinks, and he knows what that means.


End file.
